Voice integrated VOIP system

1. A method for providing telephone application services using a managed VOIP network, where voice data transmitted over the network is codified in a native VOIP format, said method comprising the acts of: providing a plurality of channels for handling incoming telephone calls and a shared memory, accessible to all channels, storing response voice data in native VOIP format; providing an I/O thread for each channel for managing all I/O, with I/O thread performing the following acts: while playing a message, giving higher priority to data transmission than to data reception; and while recording a message, giving higher priority to data reception than to data transmission; receiving a first incoming telephone call, including a first plurality of received EP packets encapsulating voice data in native format, from a service requestor over the managed VOIP network; setting up a connection between the incoming telephone call and a first one of said channels for handling the incoming telephone call; identifying a requested service; accessing response voice data, stored in the native VOIP format in said shared memory, responsive to the requested service; encapsulating said response voice data in a second plurality of response IP packets; and sending said second plurality of response IP packets over said managed VOIP network to the service requestor.

2. The method of claim 1 where said act of identifying a requested service comprises the acts of: processing voice data in native format, extracted from said received IP packets, to identify a requested service; extracting voice data from said received IP packets; and performing speech analysis on extracted voice data to identify the service requested.

3. The method of claim 1 where said act of identifying a requested service comprises the acts of: identifying a DTMF signal; determining a requested service associated with an identified DTMF signal.

4. The method of claim 1 where said act of accessing response voice data further comprising the acts of: determining whether said requested service requires text to speech (TTS) conversion; if so invoking a TTS module that converts text to non-native voice data not in native VOIP format; converting said non-native voice data to native VOIP format.

5. The method of claim 1 where said act of accessing response voice data further comprising the acts of: determining whether received voice data will be processed by a speech recognition module; if so, converting said native VOIP format voice data to non-native format voice data prior to speech recognition.

6. The method of claim 1 further comprising the act of: extracting calling ID line data from VOIP call signaling protocol to obtain location information about the service requester; accessing customized voice data, in native VOIP format, from said shared memory; encapsulating said customized voice data in customized IP packets; and sending said customized IP packets to the service requestor over the managed VoIP network.

7. A method for providing telephone application services using a managed VOIP network, where voice data transmitted over the network is codified in a native VOIP format, said method comprising the acts of: providing a plurality of channels for handling incoming telephone calls and a shared memory, accessible to all channels, storing response voice data in native VOIP format; providing a plurality of message access servers for controlling access to shared memory; receiving a first incoming telephone call, including a first plurality of received IP packets encapsulating voice data in native format, from a service requestor over the managed VOIP network; setting up a connection between the incoming telephone call and a first one of said channels for handling the incoming telephone call; identifying a requested service; utilizing a service requestor ID to access a user database holding an association between the ID and a home MAS for accessing response voice data for the service requestor, wherein the accessed response voice data is stored in the native VOIP format in said shared memory; encapsulating said response voice data in a second plurality of response IP packets.